


Hands Open, Eyes Closed

by Deastar



Series: They Say Love Heals All Wounds [18]
Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Psychics/Psionics, Angst, Backstory, Consent Issues, Internalized Homophobia, Multi, Polyamory Negotiations, Soul Bond, Unhappy Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-04
Updated: 2018-03-04
Packaged: 2019-03-27 02:19:23
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,647
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13871019
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Deastar/pseuds/Deastar
Summary: It was almost the archetypal emergency bond: an older, married, bonded player, of course—Mario, the responsible captain—and a younger player… not so much irresponsible as isolated, alone in a strange country, an ocean away from anyone he might trust enough to put on a list.





	Hands Open, Eyes Closed

**Author's Note:**

> This story takes place in the same universe as They Say Love Heals All Wounds, and probably won't make a ton of sense without having read that. Close to zero effort has been made at historical accuracy - for example, no real-life teammates make an appearance (except maybe by accident!), and if you ask me what year(s) this is set in, my response will be ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯.
> 
> Main content warning: This story begins with a sci-fi situation in which one character has a spontaneous “bond crisis” – he needs someone to soulbond with him, via sexual contact, to prevent serious negative medical consequences. This obviously impacts both parties' ability to fully consent, although both consent as best as they are able under the circumstances. The sexual component of this scenario takes place entirely off-screen.  
> Other content warnings: Brief mention of the historical use of electroshock therapy to "treat" homosexuality; a conversation in which a medical professional behaves like a complete asshole; brief mention of one character hurting another character accidentally during sex; and internalized homophobia.

Mario doesn’t say anything but her name, but that’s enough for Nathalie to ask immediately, “What’s wrong?”

“It’s Jaromír.”

He hears her draw in a breath. “What happened?” She’s only met Jaromír a few times, but she’s fond of him – charmed by him, really.

“Bond crisis.”

“Oh, no,” she says softly. He waits for her. “Does he have a list?”

“He does,” Mario says. He feels it crinkle under his fingers. “I’m looking at it right now. I… wish you could see it.” He tries to describe it to her – the crumpled paper, soft and stained from being kept in pockets, carried close to skin and sweat. The first four names are all Czech – faded consonant clusters, diacritical marks bleeding at the edges from long-dried stains. They are the names of people an ocean away. It’s taken the last three hours for Mario to make sure of that. Two of them are men’s names. It took courage, Mario thinks, to carry that around.

The fifth name is also a man’s name. It’s not like the others – it’s new: clear and unfaded. The letters are small, crammed down at the bottom of the paper even though there’s an inch of blank space above it, like a secret… small enough that Mario could keep his thumb over it when he showed the first four names to people from the team, trying to find the people Jaromír had trusted with his life, then left behind.

“It’s your name,” Nathalie says.

“Yes.” The fact of it sits between them for a minute. Mario starts, “The team is… looking into hiring a professional—”

“Don’t be stupid,” she says, interrupting him. More quietly, she repeats, “Don’t be stupid.” She pauses, then says, “Unless you’re not sure you can… I mean, physically…”

“That won’t be a problem,” Mario tells her.

It occurs to him that she might have questions about that, but she just replies, “I thought not.”

“Do I have your permission—”

“Of course,” she says firmly. “You were right to ask. But of course.”

A part of Mario wants to take that answer and run, but he makes himself warn, “You know if I resolve the crisis… I’ll bond with him.”

Nathalie makes an impatient noise. “I know what I’m saying you can do.” For a few seconds, Mario can’t hear anything but her breathing. “Will you try to break it, after?” she asks hesitantly.

“Of course,” Mario replies, surprised. “I only asked because… you know it may not work.”

“I do.” There’s no hint of hesitation in her voice.

“I mean,” Mario explains, “they could trade him and try to let the distance break it, but I don’t… I don’t want that.”

“No. I don’t want that, either.”

Many other women would – would want their husband’s bondmate as far away as possible, until the inconvenient second bond snapped and everything was back to how it used to be. But Nathalie is not that kind of woman.

“Thank you,” says Mario. The words aren’t enough.

“It means a lot, that he trusts you,” Nathalie says, with emphasis. “It’s important.”

“Yeah.”

“I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

Mario hangs up the phone and leaves his own hotel room to knock on the door of Jaromír’s. Jack answers, looking worried, and asks, “Where’ve you been?”

Mario walks past him into the room. Jaromír is curled up on the bed in his undershirt and jeans, flushed and restless. He doesn’t look at Mario, but Mario can read that Jaromír is waiting on his words with almost painful focus. Lukas is sitting on the side of the bed, worrying his baseball cap between his hands.

Mario says, “I was on the phone with Nathalie.”

Jack and Lukas look confused, but Jaromír’s head snaps up and his eyes fix on Mario with wild hope. He knows there’s only one reason for Mario to have called Nathalie in the middle of all this.

Mario sits down on the side of the bed and brushes the hair off of Jaromír’s sweaty forehead. “Can you give us a minute, guys?”

Lukas is still confused, but Jack’s starting to see the shape of things, and he hurries Luke out of the hotel room without a word.

“We’ve been trying to find the four people on your list.” There are five people on Jaromír’s list, as Jaromír and Mario both know, but Jaromír doesn’t call him on it. “They’re all still in Czechoslovakia.”

“Yes,” Jaromír rasps, and shoots Mario a disapproving look. “I can tell you this.”

This isn’t at all relevant or constructive, but Mario can’t help saying, “What the hell were you thinking, coming here when you hadn’t had your crisis yet—or… does your family have late crises—”

“No,” Jaromír says, unapologetic. “We have early. I know when I come.”

“Then what were you doing, coming someplace you didn’t know anyone, didn’t have anyone you could trust? Are you crazy?”

Jaromír shrugs, still holding Mario’s gaze. “I do for hockey. You do same, if it’s you.”

Mario is forced to admit that that’s true, and Jaromír smiles. “Yes.” His smile gets softer, more heated. “You understand.”

Mario takes a deep breath. “My name is on your list. Why?”

Jaromír turns his face away, rubbing his cheek against the pillow and bleeding crawling embarrassment. “You make me say?”

“I called my wife,” Mario says.

“What she say?”

“Why me?” Mario counters. It’s not fair of him to bargain this way when Jaromír is so out of it, but he needs to know – for Jaromír’s sake as well as his own.

Jaromír is silent for a minute. Finally, he says softly, “Trust you. Good man. I know you be good to me.”

“Is that the only reason?”

“Like you. Be bond to you not bad.” He can feel Jaromír gathering his courage, but he’s still not prepared when Jaromir turns to him, completely unshielded, and just _looks_ at Mario—the wave of _want_ that crashes over him, sincere and almost powerful enough to sweep Mario away. Some of that is the bond crisis – but it can’t all be. It’s too specific… and Jaromír is too ashamed of it. Looking away again, Jaromír whispers, “This also.”

Mario reaches out and cups his hand delicately over Jaromír’s jaw, brushing his thumb over Jaromír’s cheek. “Okay,” he says quietly, and leaves it at that.

“Do you still want me to resolve this?” It’s such an antiseptic way to talk about what they’re about to do: _Do you still want me to fuck you? Do you still want me to bond with you – to know you intimately in a way you’ve never been known by another person?_

“Yes,” Jaromír says, steady.

Mario breathes, in then out. “Then I will.”

Jaromír’s heart seems to break with relief, which Mario didn’t even know a heart could do – but Jaromír can’t shield for shit right now, and Mario can’t get away from the full depth of Jaromír’s emotions. But Jaromír doesn’t smile, and his relief doesn’t last more than a second before lapsing into tension again. “What Nathalie say?”

“She said it was okay.” Jaromír shakes his head as if he doesn’t understand, so Mario says, “She wants me to take care of you.”

Mario’s shocked when Jaromír’s eyes fill with tears. “Why?” Jaromír whispers, pouring out his bewilderment. “Why she do that?” He shakes his head, spilling a few tears out of the corners of his eyes. “I never do anything for her. Why she say okay? Why she want… take care?”

Mario doesn’t understand why Jaromír is so upset, but he gathers Jaromír up in his arms anyway, lets Jaromír shake into his shoulder, while he tries to explain something that doesn’t seem to him to need much explanation. “She likes you,” he says truthfully, but that just makes Jaromír even more confused. “Why?” he asks.

“She thinks you’re charming,” Mario says, which is also true.

Jaromír looks up at Mario. “What is ‘charming’?”

Mario bites his lip. “It’s a hard thing to explain. You made her laugh. You were polite. She liked you when she met you. And she knows I like you. She likes that I like you.”

Jaromír shakes his head. “This is reasons?” he asks, disbelieving. “Make laugh, make polite – this is reasons for let me… bond with bondmate, sex with husband… I don’t understand.”

Mario could say that Nathalie is a generous soul, a compassionate person, and it’s true, but he’s not sure he has the words, and he’s not sure Jaromír would understand that, either. He’s so used to Nathalie’s loving heart that he forgets, sometimes, how truly rare it is. Instead, he says, honestly, “When Nathalie came here with me, she didn’t know anyone. She didn’t know the city, she didn’t have any friends. She felt very alone. It was hard for her. And I think when she realized you didn’t have anybody else – that you’d left so much behind to come here – she understood that.”

Jaromír is quiet for a while. Then he vows, fiercely, “I do so much for her. I buy her… jewels, I do anything she want.”

“You don’t have to do that.”

“I will,” Jaromír says stubbornly.

There’s no point in arguing with Jaromír when he’s this out of it, so Mario just says, “Thank you.”

 

*

 

Afterward, with Jaromír’s head pillowed on his chest, and the bond wrapped around them, warm and alive, Mario imagines bringing Jaromír to a bond specialist, waiting in a cold, sterile room so they can be cut apart – so Mario can go home to his family’s embrace and Jarda can go, alone, to his empty apartment, rejected by the only person on this continent he really trusts. He could pretend that he can imagine going through with it… but if he’s honest with himself, Mario can’t envision any scenario that doesn’t end with him grabbing Jaromír and running out the door.

Jaromír is a pretty strong reader – about as strong as Mario himself. He looks up at Mario and says, thoughtful, “You want keep me.”

“Yes.” Mario rubs his thumb over Jaromír’s cheekbone. “Can I?”

“Yeah.” Jaromír leans up to kiss him, and Mario almost loses himself in how good it is. “I want,” Jaromír says softly, when they break apart.

“We’ll have to say we broke it,” Mario thinks aloud.

Jaromír shivers, drawing closer to the heat of Mario’s body. “Yes.”

Mario holds him tighter and tries to share his warmth. “I won’t let you down,” he promises recklessly.

He will. But he doesn’t know that yet. And anyway, that’s years away. Tonight, they’re happy.

 

*

 

When they’re back in Pittsburgh, Jaromír gets in Mario’s car without comment, and Mario heads home. On the way, Jaromír suddenly says, “Turn here,” pointing at a strip mall by the side of the road.

Mario blinks, confused, and Jaromír insists, “Turn now. Please?”

Mario pulls over into the strip mall parking lot and starts to worry that Jaromír has changed his mind about coming home with him. He opens his mouth to offer to drive Jaromír to his apartment, but Jaromír points at the florist’s shop in front of them, and says, “Flowers? For—for Nathalie.”

It seems like an incredibly odd thing to do, at first – to show up at your bondmate’s house with flowers for his wife, who you barely know. But on reflection, Mario can’t say it’s that strange an impulse—he’s not sure what _would_ be an appropriate “thank you for giving your husband permission to fuck me” gift, and flowers are certainly better than anything expensive, like jewelry, that might give the impression that Jaromír’s trying to buy Mario off of her.

“You don’t have to get her anything—” Mario tries, but Jaromír gives off a wave of rejection before he even opens his mouth.

“I say I do,” he says firmly. “And you say she like me for I’m polite. She like polite. So I want be polite.”

Mario can’t argue with that. He waits while Jaromír goes into the florist’s shop and comes out with a tasteful bouquet—not so large as to be ostentatious, but not so small as to seem half-hearted.

“That’s a nice one,” he says.

Jaromír ducks his head. “I tell girl in store I need big thank-you for wife who save my life.” He shrugs. “All true. She help me choose.”

Mario nods. He doesn’t say anything else, but as soon as he pulls into the driveway, he thinks that might have been a mistake. Jaromír is staring at the front door, broadcasting nerves so bad that it’s making Mario’s teeth hurt.

Mario sets his hand on Jaromír’s shoulder briefly and says, “It’s all right. It’s really going to be all right. Come on.”

He gets out of the car and doesn’t bother with his bag – he can deal with it later, and all he can think of right now is seeing Nathalie’s face, smelling her familiar perfume and feeling the sense of home that she carries in her smile. Before he can even ring the doorbell, the front door opens, and there she is.

He whispers, “Nathalie….” and she’s in his arms, warm and certain and pouring out love and concern through every place their bodies touch. “I missed you,” he says, even though it’s only been a few days.

But she says, “I missed you, too,” and he knows she understands.

Eventually she steps back. “Are you all right?” she asks, and Mario nods.

“I’m all right,” he says, which is mostly true. He can sense Jaromír behind him, so he steps aside until Nathalie and Jarda are face-to-face. “This is Jaromír. You’ve met a few times before—”

“Yes,” Nathalie murmurs.

Mario looks at the two of them, Nathalie standing just inside the door, Jaromír just outside it. Jaromír is pale with fear, and his right hand is crushing the stems in the bouquet to death. His shields aren’t down deliberately, Mario thinks, but they might as well be – he’s broadcasting everything he’s feeling right now. Nathalie must be able to read every bit of it: ice-white fear and bruise-purple shame.

Nathalie draws in a breath to speak, but Jaromír says first, “Please forgive.” They’re not just rote words – he’s begging. “Please, I’m sorry, Mrs. Lemieux—”

“You don’t have to be sorry,” Nathalie interrupts, kindly rather than abruptly. “You really don’t. And I hope you’ll call me Nathalie.”

Jaromír nods jerkily. “Yes. N-Nathalie,” he says, slowly, as if her name is a word describing a new, unfamiliar concept. “I’m—thank you. Thank you,” he repeats, looking like he might topple over at her feet.

“And may I call you… Jaromír? Am I saying that right?”

“Yes,” he rushes to say, “yes, you say right.”

“Thank you,” she replies. Mario can feel Jaromír’s disbelief at being _thanked_ by this woman just for approving of her pronunciation. He’s marveling at her – staring, really – and seems to have forgotten how to talk.

Nathalie prompts him, “Are those for me?” gesturing at the flowers.

Jolted, Jaromír quickly holds them out to her, nodding and saying, “Yes, for you. I… if you don’t like, very sorry—”

Nathalie takes the bouquet from him carefully, and openly admires it, brushing the tips of her fingers over the petals of the roses. The roses are a deep, rich yellow, and they’re intermixed with pink tulips—not an infantilizing baby pink, but a bright pink that almost seems to glow.

“I love them,” she says, dropping her shields so Jaromír will know that she’s sincere. “They’re beautiful. Did Mario tell you that yellow is my favorite color?”

Jaromír shakes his head silently.

“Well, then you must just have excellent taste,” she says, smiling at Jaromír so warmly that Mario can feel Jaromír’s fear melting under it. After a moment, Jaromír even manages a hesitant smile in return.

“Thank you for these,” Nathalie says to him. “I’m going to put them in water. Won’t you please come in?” She’s smart – phrased that way, it sounds like Jaromír is doing her a favor by coming inside, and so of course Jaromír hurries to follow her in, and then to follow her up the stairs to the kitchen.

“Mario, could you get me a vase, please?”

All of which is to say, it goes well. But everything is still so fragile, so uncertain. They can’t rest easy yet.

 

*

 

Mario takes a deep breath and tells the doctor, “We need you to do something for us. We have money, we can—”

The doctor cuts him off with a dismissive noise. “Don’t. It’s not worth losing my license.”

“We wouldn’t tell—”

“—not worth losing my license,” the doctor continues, “just to tell your bosses what’s already true.”

“Already true?”

“It can’t be broken. Your bond.” When Mario stares at him in shock, he gives Mario a cynical smile. “That _is_ what you wanted to bribe me to say, wasn’t it?”

“Yes—“

“He that good, then?” The doctor tips his head toward Jaromír, still talking only to Mario, as if Jaromír is a dog or a small child, not qualified to be part of the conversation. “Or maybe it’s just nice to get the ass without having to listen to all the chit-chat. That’s a plus of the foreign ones, I guess.”

It takes Mario a minute to parse that—partly because it’s so vile he can hardly wrap his head around it—but when he does, he says icily, “ _Excuse me_?”

The doctor flaps a hand at Mario casually. “Don’t get pissy with me. I’m a married man myself.” He leans back in his chair and smiles. “Might be worth my license not to tell your bosses _why_ it can’t be broken, though.”

“Why can’t it?” Mario asks, throat tight.

“Because you don’t want it to be,” the doctor answers. “Neither of you.”

_Fuck_ , Mario thinks. He knew that, but he didn’t think that a bond doctor would be able to _tell_ just by looking at them.

The doctor continues, “When I was in medical school, they taught us about this – two normal guys, maybe even married guys, who’d bond and then, for some damn reason, get so attached to that bond that you couldn’t break it. Big psychological mystery. Probably something to do with their fathers. They taught us to use aversive therapy to break it. Electroshock.” His smile is amused, nasty. “Of course, these are enlightened times. We don’t do that anymore. Probably because we understand that if you want him stuck to you that badly, it’s because you want to stick it somewhere your wife won’t let you. Not such a mystery after all.”

Mario can’t reply—he can barely fucking breathe, and he doesn’t know if it’s from anger or from fear.

The doctor, of course, can read all of that on him without even trying, and he laughs. “Don’t worry, _Super Mario_. Your secret’s safe with me. I’ll give ‘em some mumbo-jumbo, and you can just stick to looking noble as hell and telling your little Comrade that assfucking is how we say hello here in America.”

Mario honestly isn’t sure how he gets the two of them out of the doctor’s office without punching him in the face or throwing up. In the car, Jaromír reaches for him, but Mario shakes his head and drives home as fast as he can. As soon as they’re through the door, he pulls Jaromír into his arms and holds him while they both shake.

“We’re safe,” Mario breathes. “That’s what matters. I get to keep you. We’re not breaking it. That’s all that matters.”

 

*

 

Nathalie is sorting photographs when she hears a loud _bang_ from the laundry room. Her heart jumps, and she has to put a hand on her chest to steady herself. As she walks toward the laundry room, it occurs to her that she may be doing a very stupid thing – no one is ever in there except for her, and Mario is out of the house for the day.

But when she pushes the door open quietly, it’s just Jaromír, squinting at the back of a bottle of laundry detergent and looking frustrated.

“Jaromír,” she says, relieved and confused at the same time. “What are you doing down here?”

He blinks at her and says, uncertainly, “Wash clothes?”

She smiles; ask a stupid question, get a stupid answer, because why else would someone be in the laundry room? “All right. Do you know how to work the washing machine?”

He makes a face, and mutters, “At home, Mama wash. But I learn,” he adds, resolute.

“Well, I’m happy to show you, if you want. But I’m curious about why you decided to start doing laundry today.”

He looks at the ground. “I hear what you say to Mario, about how I live here, now you have to wash a lot more clothes, because hockey players make a lot dirty clothes, and wear big clothes because we big. Sorry for not think of this before – I wash now, not make you do more.”

“Oh, Jaromír.” Nathalie rests a hand on Jaromír’s arm and waits for him to meet her eyes. “I was just joking,” she says gently. “I don’t mind doing the laundry a little more often. I appreciate the thought, but you really don’t have to do this.” She reaches out to take the detergent from his hands, but he holds onto it stubbornly.

“Want to learn,” he says. “Don’t want to make more work for you. You so nice to me,” he says softly, “do a lot for me. Don’t want you have to do more.”

Nathalie considers arguing about it, but decides against it. “Okay,” she says instead. “Here’s how you sort things.”

She teaches him how to sort the clothes by their colors, and warns him about putting delicates in a separate bag. She also warns him about checking for dry-clean items, because Mario has a terrible habit of just dumping any and all dirty clothes into the same hamper. Jaromír listens intently. He blushes when she pulls one of her bras out of a pile to show him what needs to go in the mesh bag, which is almost unbearably charming. As she shows him where the detergent and the bleach are, and how to measure enough of both, they can’t really avoid standing close – it’s not a large room. Jaromír’s shields are up, but it doesn’t really matter: as close as they are, she can’t really help being aware of his attraction to her. When they pass pieces of clothing back and forth, their fingers brush, and she can feel how it affects him.

It’s not one-sided. Jaromír is gorgeous, and he’s polite and sweet, and he wants her – all powerful attractors, Nathalie can admit. When they start up the load of laundry they’ve been working on, and the machine is chugging happily away behind them, Nathalie takes a deep breath and reaches up to rest a hand on Jaromír’s chest. “Jaromír,” she says softly. “I’d like to kiss you now.”

Jaromír doesn’t move – in truth, he hardly breathes. He stays perfectly still as Nathalie leans up and brushes a chaste kiss across his lips. “Jaro,” Nathalie whispers, more breath than sound, and Jaromír makes a wounded noise. He kisses her, licking into her mouth and moaning when she responds.

When he pulls back, Nathalie scrapes her nails gently along the back of his neck and asks, “Will you come to bed with me?”

She’s not prepared for the surge of piercing sorrow that breaks through his shields. He starts to tremble, and without warning, he folds down to the floor to kneel at her feet.

“I have to ask you,” he whispers. “So sorry. So bad to you, to say this. But please, I’m say _please_ , Nathalie. Don’t ask me for this.”

Shaken, Nathalie begins, “I’m n—you don’t have to if you don’t—”

“I promise I give you anything you want.” His voice is steady and certain, but when he reaches for her hand and presses his forehead against her knuckles, skin on skin, it feels to her reading as if he’s being ripped in half. “Anything you want. I make swear this, during crisis – promise I give you anything you want, for what you give me. So if you ask for this, I give,” he says quietly. “Won’t say no to you. But please—it break Mario’s heart. He love you so much, he think every good thing about you. Please don’t ask me for hurt him this way.”

Confused, still trying to fathom an interaction that’s turned out to be much more fraught than she was expecting, Nathalie asks, “Why—you think it would hurt Mario if the two of us, you and me, if we… had sex?”

“Hurt, yes,” Jaromír says, nodding seriously. “Angry also. He never forgive me. If you ask, I give anyway. Because I promise. But then with me and Mario, everything broken. So please, Nathalie – please don’t ask.”

Nathalie is feeling her way through this conversation in the dark, but she knows the first thing she has to say. “Then I’m not asking,” she tells Jaromír. “You’re right, I take it back. I won’t ask, all right? Not if it would hurt Mario or make him angry with you. I don’t want either of those things.”

Jaromír blows out a breath of obvious relief, echoed by a matching wave of relief leaking through his shields.

Nathalie is glad that he’s no longer feeling quite so tragic, but she finds herself still with a lot of questions. Somewhat against her better judgment, she asks him, “Don’t you think that’s hypocritical, though?”

Nathalie realizes her mistake right away, from the confusion Jaromír is giving off. She amends, “Isn’t it unfair for Mario to be mad if I sleep with someone else, since he’s sleeping with someone else?”

Jaromír is clearly taken aback. “Who Mario sleep with?”

Nathalie is equally taken aback. “With… with you!”

“What?” He shakes his head. “You think Mario still have sex with me?”

“Well,” Natalie says, feeling off-balance, “yes, I did. I suppose I just assumed. Because you’re bondmates.”

“No,” Jaromír rushes to assure her. “Mario don’t touch me like this. Only for crisis, not after.”

“Then—I’m sorry,” Nathalie interrupts herself nervously, “this is none of my business—”

“Is your husband, is your bondmate, is your business,” Jaromír says firmly.

“Then… when Mario stays with you at night… or when he goes down to your room during the day…”

Jaromír shrugs. “Just sleep. Or read books, watch TV. Talk. Not sex.”

Nathalie finds herself more jealous, oddly, at the thought that Jaromír has gotten Mario to read than she was at the thought that Jaromír and Mario were having sex.

She can’t stop herself from asking, though. “Well—again, this is none of my business, but—why not?”

Jaromír looks dumbfounded.

“I mean, you both want to…”

“Want, yes,” Jaromír mumbles. “But it’s wrong.”

Nathalie considers this. “Because you’re both men?”

“No,” Jaromír says immediately, but almost as soon as he says it, his face twists up. After a moment of tension, he says softly, “Maybe.” He looks at the ground, then back up at Nathalie’s face. “Don’t know,” he admits sounding defeated. “But that’s not reason.”

“Then what’s the reason?”

Jaromír looks at her like it’s a trick question. “Mario is married. Sex is for wife.”

“So he told you no?” Nathalie asks.

“I tell _him_.” Jaromír says it insistently, almost proudly.

Nathalie frowns. “I said it was okay – I thought he told you that.”

“You say for crisis, it’s okay,” Jaromír points out. “After, normal, is different.”

“What if I told you I really don’t mind?”

She can feel Jaromír thinking through what to say. He says, after a minute, “I’m man, so I don’t know for sure. But I think many women say, ‘don’t mind,’ when really they don’t want. When really something hurt. Don’t want to hurt you,” he finishes softly.

That’s—that’s very psychologically astute, actually. “You’re right,” she tells him, equally softly. “But it wouldn’t hurt me. I swear it.”

Jaromír makes a humming sound, neither agreeing nor disagreeing, and turns back to the laundry. “I’m sort this,” he tells her. “You don’t worry.”

So apparently they’re done with that conversation. That’s probably for the best, for now.

“Okay,” she tells him, retreating as gracefully as she can, “I won’t worry.”

 

*

 

That night, as she’s lying beside Mario, Natalie says, “Jaromír told me today that the two of you haven’t fucked since the crisis.”

Mario chokes on his own spit for a second, but he thinks he recovers well. “You knew that, though,” he points out.

“I really didn’t,” she tells him.

He takes a minute to absorb that. Then another minute. “So you thought all this time, we were—”

“Yes.”

Mario’s not sure what to say to that. In the end, he goes with, “Well. You’ve been very calm about it.”

Nathalie just smiles. “Jaromír said it was because of me. For both of you.”

“I think that’s true, yeah.”

“You want him. Don’t you?”

Mario considers his words carefully. “I made a vow to be faithful to you. I want Jaromír. But there’s nothing I want from him more than I want to keep that vow.”

“And if you could have both? If I gave you permission?”

Mario takes a deep breath. “You don’t have to do that.”

“I’m not worried.” She kisses him. “You have my _permanent_ permission to have a sexual relationship with Jaromír. Permanent and unconditional.”

“You don’t have to make it permanent—”

“If I don’t, then I might as well not give it at all. I’ve thought about this, Mario,” she says, meeting his gaze – he can read through the bond that she’s dead serious, steady as a deep-rooted tree. “If I were Jaromír, I don’t think I could bear to start something with you if I knew it could just be taken away at any time.”

He sees her point, but… “Any relationship can end at any time, with no warning.”

Through their bond, he can sense her initial resistance, and then her acquiescence. “That’s true.” He can tell she’s thinking about it. Eventually she shrugs. “Still.”

“Okay.” Mario accepts that it’s important to her, and that’s enough for him.

She asks, “You got the unconditional part, too, didn’t you?”

Mario agrees, smiling bemusedly. He thinks he can safely say that he has paid _very_ close attention to every word of this conversation.

“You’re not going to lose my permission because of doing something I don’t want or not doing something that I _do_ want,” she continues. She seems to be waiting for an answer, so Mario agrees again.

“Good.” She nods, and a little shiver of nerves goes through her, making Mario frown. Then she meets his eyes and says, “Then I want to ask for _your_ permission to have a sexual relationship with Jaromír.”

Mario chokes on his own spit for the second time tonight. When he’s breathing normally again, he tries to figure out what to say.

“You can say no,” Nathalie tells him – her nerves are stronger now.

“Does he even—” _want to_ , Mario starts to say, but he knows the answer to that one. Jaromír’s reaction to Nathalie has always been a kind of stunned gratitude and reverence, threaded through with a hopeless, tender attraction that Jaromír had never even bothered to try to hide from Mario, secure in his conviction that it would never occur to Nathalie to think of him that way.

Apparently he was wrong. The first part still gives Mario pause. “He’s very much in awe of you,” Mario says, trying for tact. “I’m a little concerned about…” It seems ridiculous to say _a power imbalance_ , with Jaromír nearly a foot taller and at least fifty pounds heavier than Nathalie, but Nathalie seems to know what he means.

“Yes, I’m a little concerned about that, too,” she admits. “He told me he’d do anything I asked him to, and as nice as that sounds in theory, I don’t want to pressure him or end up taking more than he wants to give. I think I can handle that, though. If you’re willing to let me try.”

“I’m willing,” Mario replies – he doesn’t know where this road they’re walking will lead, but he knows he trusts her to walk it with him. That part has never been in doubt.

 

*

 

When Jaromír starts to come home later after games, it doesn’t worry Nathalie – he’s young, and she knows that he goes home with other women sometimes. It doesn’t bother her. After all, it’s not like Jaromír is the only man in _her_ life. But when it goes on for a week, that equanimity becomes harder to hold. Eventually, she resorts to cornering him while he’s packing for a road trip, even though it means coming into his bedroom, which she doesn’t like to do without being invited.

Hanging in the doorway, she asks softly, “Are you angry with me? I feel like you’ve been avoiding me—”

“Not angry, no, no,” Jaromír rushes to assure her, and she can read his sincerity. “No, could not be angry with you. Just… hear some things. Have to think about them.” He won’t look at her, though… so for all his sincerity, there’s still something that he doesn’t want her to know.

“Hear what?” Nathalie presses. “Did someone say something to you? Did Mario?”

“No… is just…” He looks up at her quickly, and seems to read that she won’t be backing down. He abandons his suitcase and leans back against the wall – it makes him look small, which is hard to believe.

“Out at bar with team,” Jaromír begins. “Guys tell me I need girlfriend – I tell them always that I don’t want girlfriend, not ready for serious.” Which is a sick sort of joke – Jaromír has managed to carry on two serious romantic relationships where most men his age can hardly handle _one_. “Then Paul say he has idea – say to me I need to find hot older woman, be her… boy toy.” His mouth twists around the words as if they burn him.

Nathalie’s stomach drops for a second— _does someone know, did they find out_ —but no, if one of the guys on the team knew about her and Jaromír, they’d have told Mario, and he’d have told her. She breathes deep and tries to still her racing heart.

Jaromír continues, “I don’t know this word, so guys explain. Boy toy is young guy, older woman keep in her bed. I say this is just boyfriend – Paul say no, is different. Boyfriend, you go to dates, go to parties, take to family. Boy toy is not like this – don’t go out, don’t meet friends. He only for sex.” More quietly, he says, “Phil say I make very good boy toy – woman who want this, she like foreign, she like accent, like bad English. Like young.”

Nathalie’s chest feels two sizes too tight – she has a terrible feeling she knows where this is going.

“And I think, _Oh_.” Jaromír smiles painfully, still looking at the floor rather than her face. “Want to apologize… think maybe I act wrong, talk wrong before. We don’t have this word in Czech, don’t have this kind of relationship, so probably I make mistake, because I don’t understand. Sorry, Nathalie,” he finishes, so softly it’s almost a whisper.

“Don’t apologize to me, Jaromír,” she replies immediately, eyes burning. “You haven’t done _anything_ wrong – not a single thing.  Those guys are full of _shit_ ,” she adds, stepping forward for emphasis. The words just keep pouring out of her mouth. “Or maybe that’s what some women would want with you, but that’s not what _I_ want. That’s not what we have. Jaromír, I _love_ you.”

He looks so shocked that it scrapes her heart raw.

“I should have said that a long time ago,” she says, her voice low with shame. It’s unconscionable that that’s the first time she’s uttered the words. “I’m so sorry, Jaro. I’m so sorry for making you think you weren’t important to me. You are. You always have been.”

“I’m not… boy toy?” Jaromír asks, equal parts hope and lingering doubt.

“ _No_. You are not a—a _toy_ , for me to play with and then throw away. And you are not ‘just for sex.’ This…” Nathalie rests a hand on her own chest, then reaches hesitantly for Jaromír. “This is real,” she says quietly. “As real as—as what I have with Mario.” As soon as she says it, there’s a part of her that wants to take it back, because even though it’s true—those relationships are both equally “real,” equally legitimate—what she and Mario have is bigger than what she and Jaromír have, and she never wants to mislead Jaromír about that. Still, the rest of her is glad she said it. He needed to know. “You mean the world to me, Jaro.”

He pulls her close, gently, so gently, until his arms are wrapped around her, barely touching. He confesses softly, “I stay anyway. Even if you say for you is just sex.”

“Well, you shouldn’t,” Nathalie mutters, blinking tears out of her eyes. “You shouldn’t let anyone treat you that way. Or—fetishize you for your accent, or for being foreign—and anyway, what are they talking about, your English is getting better all the time,” she finishes, annoyed on Jaromír’s behalf.

Jaromír laughs, and she can read the warmth of his fondness for her. “Fight for me like… like lion.”

“I would,” she tells him fiercely. “You’re worth fighting for.”

 

*

 

Nathalie has hinted, now and again, that it might be fun to get all three of them in the same bed for once. Mario has generally seemed game, but Jaromír has always let her hints float by without picking them up. It’s not that he doesn’t understand them—her reading tells her that much—but the interest doesn’t seem to be there, and she’s never understood why.

Before, she’s let it go, but… it’s her birthday next week, and it would be very, _very_ hot to have both of her beautiful men focused on her at the same time. And more than that, even if Jaromír still isn’t interested, she still really wants to know _why_ , curiosity being her besetting sin. Mario and Jaromír’s relationship unfolds mostly beyond her view; she doesn’t see them in bed together, of course, but they’re also not very physically affectionate in front of her in general. When they’re watching television, sometimes she’ll see Mario wrap an arm around Jaromír’s shoulders, or Jaromír drape his legs over Mario’s lap, but that’s about as far as it goes. What they’re like together is a mystery… and mysteries drive her crazy.

So the next time they’re alone together, she flat-out asks… and regrets it immediately.

“If you want so much, we do,” Jaromír says, low, while a river of _No, please, don’t make me, I don’t want to_ pours out from behind his shields.

Fumbling, Nathalie takes it back, and tries to explain, “I just… I just wanted to know what it’s like, between you and Mario, that’s all, we don’t have to—”

Jaromír is obviously relieved, but there’s something darker woven in with that relief. “If you want to know, I tell you,” he says reluctantly, “but show… I don’t want show you. I don’t want show how is, me and Mario together.”

That stops Nathalie in her tracks. _He could mean a lot of things_ , she thinks, but there’s something cold in the pit of her stomach, an icy little ball of suspicion… and Jaromír is so young, still, and so much in awe… and maybe it’s not _Nathalie_ who should have been afraid of abusing an imbalance of power.

She hates even asking the question – but being bonded to someone doesn’t mean you know everything about them.

“Does he hurt you?” She can’t stop her voice from shaking. “Is that why—”

“No!” Jaromír rushes to say. “No, no, Nathalie – he don’t hurt me, okay? He _never_ hurt me.”

But they’re skin-to-skin, and she can tell. “Jaromír,” she says unsteadily, “you’re not telling me the whole truth.” She can read that it’s not a lie—there’s that, at least—but it’s not all true, either.

Jaromír takes a deep breath. “I tell you whole truth.” She braces herself and clutches his hand tightly. “During crisis, Mario hurt me… pretty bad,” he confesses. His voice is hushed, but she can read another pale wash of relief coming off of him, and she realizes he’s probably never told anyone this before. There hasn’t been anyone in his life he _could_ tell. She sweeps her thumb over his knuckles and just listens. “He don’t want to hurt – just don’t know. Don’t know how to fuck a man. Is different from a woman. Have to prepare, but he don’t know. So. It hurt,” he finishes quietly.

“I’m so sorry, Jaromír,” she breathes.

He shakes his head. “I don’t tell you to make you feel bad – want you to understand. Mario _know_ he hurt me. _Hate_ that he hurt me. Promise he never do again. He keep that promise, Nathalie. I’m not say all sex we have is careful, sweet – a lot is fast, rough. But he don’t hurt me again. Okay? That is whole truth.”

“Thank you.” She traces her fingertips over his cheek and kisses him. “You can tell me things like this. I want to know, okay?”

“I tell you,” he promises. He runs his hand down her back and pulls her closer as he kisses her again, deeper this time – he doesn’t break the kiss until she’s short of breath and flushed. Her lips are tingling, and his skin is warm under her hands.

“Does he know now?” she asks.

He leans in to scrape his teeth against a spot on the side of her neck that makes her shiver. “Know what?”

“How to fuck a man.”

She feels him smile against her skin. “Oh, yeah,” he whispers. His voice is rich with filthy satisfaction. “He know real good now.”

And it’s only later, toweling her hair dry after the shower, that she realizes Jaromír never answered her original question – that he never told her what it is he doesn’t want her to see.

 

*

 

Stripped naked on the hotel bed—at the far end of the hallway, or they’d never have risked it—squirming under the weight of Mario’s clothed body, Jaromír captures Mario’s hand in his own and grins, wide and toothy, like a fox. “I get wet for you, before,” he murmurs, drawing Mario’s hand back to his hole, which is slick and stretched. “I know you like that.”

Dizzy with arousal, Mario asks, “When did you—?”

“Before I come over. On my bed, in my room.”

“ _Fuck_.” Mario has to take a deep breath in. It’s a pretty fantastic, image, but, fuck, Jaromír has a road roommate – that’s why they only do this in Mario’s room. “What were you thinking? Lukas could have come in—”

“Yes,” Jaromír agrees – his face is serious but the bond is sending Mario nothing but pure wickedness. “You like that? You like Luka come in, see me on the bed, see me fuck myself with fingers?”

“No,” growls Mario. His hands are probably too tight on Jaromír’s hips. It’s sheer possessiveness, and they both know it, but Mario tries to cover himself anyway. “How would you have explained that? It would have—”

“Good question.” Jaromír smirks. “I can’t tell him the truth – can’t say, ‘Hey, Luka – I’m getting ready for Mario fuck me.’ Is secret.” He shrugs, still giving Mario that sly, sideways look. “I guess I tell him, ‘I just like it. Just like to have something in my ass.’”

Mario’s hands are _definitely_ too tight, now – he pulls them off of Jaromír’s hips and starts trying to get out of his shirt. In the meantime, he snaps, “You wouldn’t tell him that.”

“Maybe I would,” Jaromír replies, insolent. “Because you know Luka – he’s such nice man, so good teammate. So I think he ask me, ‘Jags, fingers is okay, but don’t you want cock, is better?’” Jaromír scrapes his nails down Mario’s back and grins. “I could tell him, ‘Luka, Mario give me all the cock I want. He fuck me good, _so_ good.’ But I can’t say this, can’t tell secret. I have to say, ‘Yeah, Luka, cock is better, but I don’t have anybody to give me cock. So sad,’” Jaromír sing-songs, wrapping his legs around Mario’s waist.

Mario gives up on getting his shirt off for now – instead, he shucks his pants and underwear and concentrates on sucking the biggest, angriest hickey he can manage into Jaromír’s shoulder. He’s such a little shit, and Mario is equal parts turned on and irritated.

Jaromír continues, confidingly, “You know Luka. Like I say, such nice man. Generous. I say this, he say, ‘Oh, so sad for you, Jags. You want cock, make you feel good, I can give it to you.’ And he give it to me good. I know this.”

Mario curses, and he’s not sure whether it’s at Jaromír, or at the condom packet that is refusing to tear. “You _know_ , huh?” Mario asks. The damn packet finally rips open, and he rolls the condom down his dick. “How do you _know_ how Lukas would give it to you?” He shouldn’t be this easy to rile. It’s all bullshit; they’re bonded, he would know if Jaromír was fucking someone else—besides the endless string of bar pickups, and Nathalie.

“Just got a feeling. You know.” Jaromír’s smile deepens even as he urges Mario forward and shoves their discarded clothes onto the floor. “Nobody looks in dressing room, I don’t look, but you see things anyway, you know? Can’t help it. And Luka has…” Jaromír shivers with delight.

“You are such a piece of shit,” Mario says fondly, and slides into the slick heat of Jaromír’s body in one fast stroke that makes them both gasp. After giving him a few seconds to get his bearings, Mario gets hold of Jaromír’s body and thrusts, kissing him feverishly. “You’ll say anything to make me crazy.”

Jaromír is grinning, taking the time to moan after every thrust, obviously enjoying every second of this. “You right,” he tells Mario, hands tight on Mario’s shoulders. “Luka and his big dick not enough for me.”

“Fucking right,” Mario agrees, vindicated.

But Jaromír’s grin only widens. “But Luka is such nice man, if I tell him this, he says, ‘So sorry, Jags, can’t fuck you enough. I find you more cocks to fill you up.’”

“Oh, yeah?” Mario pants. “What – the whole team, I’m guessing?”

“Oh, yeah.” Jaromír is rocking up to meet his thrusts – his eyes are going a little unfocused, lost either in his Penthouse letter or in the feel of Mario inside him. Mario chooses to believe the latter. “Whole team – everybody comes in, everybody takes a turn. Everybody except Mario.” His smile is pure devil now, dirty and dark. “Everybody takes a turn, but not Mario – Mario is married, Mario only likes women. Mario doesn’t touch. Mario just sits, and watches—” Jaromír pulls Mario’s ear down close to his mouth, and whispers, “—and _burns_.”

 

*

 

Nathalie has an instinct, as most women do, for the sound of a man’s voice raised in anger – the sound draws every particle of her focus, makes the hair rise on the back of her neck. That instinct tells her to get away from the sound, to run if she has to… but these are beloved voices, and Nathalie walks toward them instead, down the stairs, heading for Jaromír’s bedroom.

The first words she can make out are Mario’s, loud enough to reach her even on the stairs.

“I told you, I don’t like it!” She can feel his fear through their bond.

Jaromír’s voice in reply is sharp – she’s close to the bedroom now. “You try _once_. You try for one fucking second—”

“Don’t—”

As Nathalie reaches the door to Jaromír’s bedroom, she hears Jaromír interrupt, “What if _I_ don’t like, Mario?”

Mario laughs, and it’s ugly. “You know you fucking love it.”

Nathalie doesn’t know what’s going on, but she knows it shouldn’t continue.

She knocks on the door, and then tries to hold herself steady through the rippling flashes of fear, shame, defensiveness, and relief that bombard her reading – most from Mario, because of the access she has through the bond, but she recognizes the scent of Jaromír’s emotions in there, too.

Mario yanks the door open and just _looks_ at her for a minute. She can’t see past him to Jaromír.

Abruptly, he says, “I’m—I’m done with this conversation. We won’t talk about this again.” He walks past Nathalie and up the stairs.

Nathalie considers going after him, but… in this mood, he’ll just yell at _her_ , instead.

She leans on the doorframe and turns her attention to Jaromír, who’s sitting on the bed, curled in on himself, not looking at her.

“Jaromír,” she says softly. “May I come in?”

He nods stiffly, still not looking in her direction.

She steps inside and closes the door behind her, then sits on the bed beside him. He doesn’t seem inclined to talk, and she doesn’t know what to say, so she just leans into his side and tries to project support and calm.

Out of nowhere, Jaromír asks, “Mario go down on you? When you have sex?”

Nathalie is taken aback – as reluctant as Jaromír is to talk about his and Mario’s shared sex life, he’s always been equally disinclined to ask about what she and Mario do together. Too surprised to object, she stammers, “Y-yes.”

Jaromír nods, as if that’s what he expected. “Lucky you,” he says softly, and… oh. Oh.

“Is… is that what you were fighting about?” Nathalie asks, feeling fifty fathoms out of her depth.

He doesn’t answer her question, not directly. “Is okay if he really don’t like,” he says, more to himself than to her. “Not everyone like everything. But… I don’t believe,” he concludes, softly. “I think is—is don’t _want_ to like. Because like is bad. Like is…”

He bows his head, and Nathalie almost weeps at the thick cloud of shame that clogs the air around him.

“Oh, Jaro,” she says, pressing her hand over his heart.

“Sometimes I don’t feel like I want!” he says suddenly, almost snarling. “He say I ‘love it,’” he quotes bitterly, “and sometimes yes, okay? Yes. Sometimes I love. But not always.”

“No,” Nathalie agrees, trying to show understanding even though she’s not sure she understands.

“So give hand,” Jaromír continues, eyes hot, “but he says sometimes hand is boring – hand boring for me, too, Nathalie!” Now he turns to look at her, face pleading, desperate for her to understand. “But if I say this, he tell me get myself off if I’m so picky, or he laugh, tell me to pick up girl next night. Don’t want girl!” He breaks off and runs a hand over his face. He confesses, looking down, “Sometimes want girl. Sometimes make me feel better.” Then he adds, so, so softly, “Girl not ashamed about touch me. Girl like I’m strong. Like my body is man’s body. Girl not touch me wanting I’m different.”

“Jaromír—” Nathalie starts, helpless, heart breaking.

He sighs and smiles at her – it’s such a weary expression for such a young man to wear. “I love him,” he says resignedly, clearly trying to put a good face on the situation. “And he’s shithead sometimes. And I’m shithead sometimes. Is bad day today – tomorrow better. Sorry you have to hear. Have to see.”

_This is why he didn’t want me to see them together_ , Nathalie realizes, feeling sick. _This is what he didn’t want me to see. He didn’t want me to see him as—as less than a man._

Jaromír winces—probably some combination of Nathalie’s expression and whatever his reading is picking up—and shakes his head. “Not as bad as that,” he says, voice low and soothing, and he cups Nathalie’s cheek tenderly. “Today, we fight, make me sad – tomorrow, we make up, and make me happy. That’s love. Not all good, but not all bad.”

“I’ll—I’ll talk to him,” Nathalie starts, even though she has no idea of what to actually _say_ —“suck his cock, or else?”—but Jaromír shakes his head again.

“No,” he says firmly. “This is problem for me and Mario. I’m not tell him how to be husband, you how to be wife – you don’t tell how to be bondmate, okay?”

“I—” Nathalie desperately, _desperately_ wants to say yes—to _not_ have to fight with Mario and listen to him accuse her of taking Jaromír’s side, to _not_ have an awkward discussion about precisely what sex acts her husband is or isn’t performing with their mutual male lover and why or why not—but there’s still a thread of reluctance in her, a part of her that balks at the notion of letting Mario’s behavior go unchallenged when she knows she damn well wouldn’t put up with it if it were aimed at _her_.

“Nathalie.” He kisses her, then pulls back to hold her gaze. “Is problem for me and Mario,” he repeats. “You talk to him, it’s just make mad—at you _and_ at me. No good.” He lies back on the bed and holds out his arms to her. “I feel better after nap – you let me hold you, is help a lot,” he says, in a wheedling tone of voice.

“I…” Nathalie hesitates. _He’s a grown man_ , she thinks. _If he’s told me not to interfere, then I should respect that. Who am I to tell him—or Mario—how they should conduct their relationship?_ _If it’s good enough for them, that should be the end of the question_.

“Okay,” she says softly, settling down into the curve of his body, and she lets the little voice in her head accusing her of taking the easy way out gradually fade into silence.

 

*

 

Nathalie comes home from her first ultrasound appointment to find Jaromír sitting on the steps leading up to the kitchen. He was waiting for her.

“It’s time for me to go,” Jaromír tells her quietly. “Things lately… not so good, between me and Mario – some big problems. I think they get better if we get some space. Stay good friends, teammates.”

“Do you have problems with me?” Nathalie asks, almost afraid to hear the answer.

Jaromír shakes his head, smiling. “No. I’m happy with you,” he says simply. “But there’s problems for you and me even so.”

“What do you mean?”

She can tell he’s choosing his words very carefully. “I think… from things you say… maybe you start to think things about me that can’t happen. I think you starting to see family with… three parents.” Nathalie’s breath catches in her throat. She wants to say he’s wrong… but he isn’t. Even if she didn’t know it herself until this minute. “This mean a lot to me. So much. I can’t tell you.” He has to stop to collect himself, and she can see his eyes are red. “But that isn’t what this is. You guys have family with two parents – Nathalie and Mario. And Jaromír—even though he will always love you, always love Mario, always love all little Marios and little Nathalies so much—” His voice is shaking, but he gives her a smile. “I’m not in this family,” he says gently. “It’s not the same for me. It can’t be this way.”

Nathalie opens her mouth to argue, but he holds up a hand.

“Kids don’t understand about secrets. They will see I have bedroom here – see you come in my room, close door, not come out. Kids are curious – they will ask why. What will you say? We can be careful, but kids will see us kiss, see us hold hands. Maybe you say we just don’t do these things. But then, I think, it’s the same at the end. We don’t kiss, we don’t touch – it’s over for us, anyway.”

“Yes,” Nathalie agrees quietly.

“If it’s not secret, then maybe things are different,” Jaromír says, shrugging. “I asked Mario, he said no. Maybe you can change his mind, but I don’t think so.”

“You asked Mario to go public with—”

“Not with relationship!” Jaromír winces. “Fuck, no. They throw us out of league. Just with bond. If people know about bond, then I have reason to live here, we don’t have to hide that I have bedroom, that I spend lots of time with Mario. Would make the rest easier.” He shrugs again. “But Mario won’t do it. He’s scared.”

Nathalie whispers, ashamed, “I’m scared, too.” She shouldn’t care – she should be better than that. But the thought that people might know, might judge… that people might look at her and see a dupe or a beard, or worse, a gold-digger—because who would marry a faggot hockey player except for his money?—scares her beyond words.

But Jaromír doesn’t look disappointed in her. He just says, “Yeah. Me too.” He smiles crookedly. “So we’re all too scared to stay together, I think.”

“We are,” Nathalie admits. Her lion heart has deserted her, and she lets him walk away. His things are gone from the house before nightfall, and she and Mario are gone before the baby is born. They tell each other the old house was too small to hold a growing family, and tell the new owners that they used the downstairs bedroom as an office. _Just another lie_ , Nathalie thinks, and turns her gaze away.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments are deeply loved! Even just copying and pasting a line that stood out to you means a lot.
> 
> I'm also on tumblr as youhideastar, if you want to find me there!


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